My Favorite Records of 2024
“2024.” What can we say? Lot of life events happened, and music got me through them all.
Continuing the trend of recent memory, we are in a thriving death metal revival and I am here for it.
On to my favorites…
35.) Vemod - The Deepening
Clean guitar and clean singing throughout. Incredibly well done arrangements. The first track was a very slow burn but it had me hooked by the end.
34.) Pallbearer - Mind Burns Alive
Incredible record. They’ve really come into their own. Last couple records have been very strong progressions of song writing and performance. Love this one. And the Sax!!!
33.) Wormwood - The Star
Unexpected greatness. Lot of critics cite this one as being too fragmented and scatterbrained but I disagree, I love the writing and the concept and the production.
32.) Sound&Shape - Pillars of Creation
Closest I’ve heard to El Cielo since…El Cielo, heh.
31.) Autolith - Artificial Heaven
This reminded me a lot of Anti-God Hand from last year. Incredible album. Tons of range and the songwriting is outstanding.
30.) Ætheria Conscientia - The Blossoming
Incredible songwriting and performances. Loved this.
29.) Seth - La France des Maudits
This is the goods. One of the better black metal records of the year.
28.) Black Birch - S/T
Wonderful black metal record. Everything I want in the genre is on display here. Wild vocals, frenetic drums, lo fi but not terrible production, great guitar hooks.
27.) Dawn Treader - Bloom & Decay
Dissonant and wonderfully filthy.
26.) Pyrrhon - Exhaust
Love this band. Organized chaos at it’s finest. They really embrace and go all in on the weird riffs and polyrhythm stuff they do on this album.
25.) Horna - Nyx (Hymnejä yölle)
Oh baby. Wow. Unexpected greatness here. Some of the catchiest guitar riffs of the year. So good.
24.) Glacial Tomb - Lightless Expanse
Khemmis guitarist and bassist, great album. Riffs on riffs on riffs! And what is going on with this incredible album artwork?!
23.) Gaerea - Coma
Incredible record. Huge growth on this one. This band has something special with the adrenaline in their song writing. Goose bumps all the time. Outstanding. Love this band.
22.) Spectral Lore - IV (Part 1)
Incredible album. Looking forward to part 2. Arrangements and guitar work is wonderful, really interesting songwriting.
21.) Spectral Wound - Songs of Blood and Mire
Great record. Loved this. Very interesting arrangements and guitar melodies. Good production for black metal (lofi but not shitty sounding.)
20.) Replicant - Infinite Mortality
Good shit. This is really great dissonant death metal.
19.) Night Verses - Every Sound Has a Color in the Valley of Night
Whoa. Second half of this was equally as incredible as the first. Makes the first part that much better and more impactful, in my opinion. Masterpiece.
18.) Knocked Loose - You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To
Wow. This blew me away. The Poppy feature that got nominated for a Grammy (Suffocate) is in the running for my favorite song of the year.
17.) Black Curse - Burning in a Celestial Poison
Whoa, this is the goods. Frenetic and wonderful. Cool cast of characters, too.
16.) Oak, Ash, & Thorn - Our Grief is Thus
Not expecting this level of greatness. Reminds me a lot of Khemmis. Excellent record. Melodies, harmonies, drum heroics, this album has it all.
15.) Huntsmen - The Dry Land
Whoa baby. Loved this. Incredible vocal harmonies, love the arrangements. Huge growth in songwriting from Mandala of Fear. Huge production.
14.) Vale of Pnath - Between the Worlds of Life and Death
I expect we’ll be celebrating the 10th anniversary of this album. Shred city.
13.) Julie Christmas - Ridiculous and Full of Blood
Big fan of Julie Christmas and this album has been wonderful. Supernatural is one of my favorite songs of the year. The Lighthouse is really good, too, with Johannes from Cult of Luna.
12.) Job For a Cowboy - Moon Healer
Unexpectedly amazing. One of the proggiest metal releases of the year so far. Incredible rhythm section. Seriously. Outstanding record and a gigantic progression in their level of musicianship and songwriting.
11.) Bedsore - Dreaming the Strife for Love
Weird as fuck. Sounds like Ray Manzorek playing with Dog Fashion Disco, maybe. Great record. Weird in the best ways.
10.) Slimelord - Chytridiomycosis Relinquished
Incredible. Right up my alley. Long death metal songs, heh. Filthy production, great riffs, great writing, really cool melodies. And that album artwork is something else.
9.) Inter Arma - New Heaven
I think I’d put it between Paradise Gallows and Sulphur English in my list of their discog favs. Wonderful record. This band continues to push themselves and prove why they are one of the best to do the damn thing.
8.) Paysage D’Hiver - Die Berge
First two tracks are perfect. Rest of the album is equally wonderful, but the first two could have been on their own and that would have been wonderful, too. Great album. That said, I like Im Wald better, I think. But this is second best overall in discography to me.
7.) Oranssi Pazuzu - Muuntautuja
This band is wacky and I am here for it. Great stuff. Weird as fuck and creepy as hell. Nightmare music.
6.) SLIFT - ILION
Wonderful Elder-like. Some truly wonderful guitar tones throughout. Great songs.
5.) Vitriol - Suffer & Become
One of the best death metal records I’ve heard in a long time, and that’s saying something. Incredible songwriting and performances. Kyle riffs so hard and flies all over the fretboard with ease and taste. Shame and it’s Afterbirth might be the best death metal song I’ve heard in decades. Incredible. It’s too bad they fell apart on the tour for this record.
4.) Kendrick Lamar - GNX
Solid. Not sure where this sits in his discography for me yet, time will tell…pretty high up there, though. wacced out murals, squabble up, tv off, peekaboo…whole album is bangers.
3.) Cave Sermon - Divine Laughter
Whoa. Good shit. Great production and songwriting. Long songs! Lots of pretty parts amidst the savagery. There’s something interesting this band does with rhythms and syncopations that you don’t hear very often in progressive death metal. It’s like they find a way to make the beat and rhythm it’s own instrument, if that makes sense? This band should be huge.
2.) Ulcerate - Cutting the Throat of God
BIG HYPE!!! This was outstanding. Dissonant death at it’s finest. One of the best drumming performances of the year, maybe the decade. Outstanding record and, any other year, this gets my top spot. Alas…
1.) Blood Incantation - Absolute Elsewhere
Album of the year. Wow. Amazing record. What a journey! This is so dense. Great voyage. I love the guitars, synths, vocals, drums, bass, heh, everything about this is wonderful. Masterfully written and arranged. This record has everything I enjoy about interesting music. It leans in to the psychdelic synths for the right amount of time to leave them feeling impactful every time they rear their head to the foreground. Nothing about this feels forced or “extra” and everything fits. I used to describe Between the Buried and Me as the “Pink Floyd of Death Metal” but uh, Blood Incantation is that band now. One of the best albums I have ever heard, period. Cannot fathom where they go next, but I want to experience it. Album of the year, at least. Album of the decade? Only time will tell.
Honorable Mentions
- Aborted - Vault of Horrors
- Alcest - Les Chants de l’Aurore
- Aureole - Alunarian Bellmaster
- Austere - Beneath the Threshold
- Benighted - Ekbom (9 / 10)
- Better Lovers - Highly Irresponsible
- Beyoncé - COWBOY CARTER
- Bongripper - Empty
- Borknager - Fall
- Botanist - Paleobotany
- Brume - Marten
- CANDY - It’s Inside You
- Charli XCX - Brat
- Chelsea Wolfe - She Reaches Out to She Reaches Out to She
- Cognitive - Abhorrence
- Cosmic Putrefaction - Emerald Fires Atop the Farewell Mountains
- Dua Lipa - Radical Optimism
- Doechii - Alligator Bites Never Heal
- ERRA - CURE
- Exocrine - Legend
- Feind - Ambulante Hirnamputation
- From Dying Suns - Calamity
- Gatecreeper - Dark Superstition
- Gigan - Anomalous Abstractigate Infinitessimus
- Hemwick - Acedia
- High on Fire - Cometh the Storm
- Immortal Bird - Sin Querencia
- Judas Priest - Invincible Shield
- Julia Holter - Something in the Room She Moves
- Kamasi Washington - Fearless Movement
- Knoll - As Spoken
- Krallice - Inorganic Rites
- Leprous - Melodies of Atonement
- Liminal Shroud - Visions of Collapse
- Lord Dying - Clandestine Transcendance
- Luciferian Rites - Oath of Midnight Ashes
- meth. - SHAME
- MONO - OATH
- Nails - Every Bridge Burning
- Necrowretch - Swords of Dajjal
- Ohpen Ahrms - Lying Beside You
- Opeth - The Last Will and Testament
- Rendered Helpless - From Nothing Comes All
- Resin Tomb - Cerebral Purgatory
- Rezn - Burden
- Rotting Christ - Pro Xristou
- Scarcity - The Promise of Rain
- Sons of Ra - Tropic of Cancer
- Spectral Voice - Sparagmos
- Squid Pisser - Dreams of Puke
- Summoning the Lich - Under The Reviled Throne
- Taylor Swift - THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT: THE ANTHOLOGY
- The Black Dahlia Murder - Servitude
- The Last of Lucy - Godform
- Them Moose Rush - Zepaxia
- Thou - Umbilical
- Tyler, The Creator - CHROMAKOPIA
- Undeath - More Insane
- Vuur & Zijde - Boezum
- White Stones - Memoria Viva
- Witch Vomit - Funeral Sanctum